Chapter 5: The King's Inspection
The only sound was the ragged syncopation of their breathing beginning to slow. Catherine stared at the embroidered canopy above, her body a map of strange aches and startling sensitivities. The warmth of him along her side was a foreign country.
Michael shifted, the mattress dipping. He rolled onto his back, one arm flung over his eyes. A long, slow breath hissed out between his teeth.
“Well,” he said to the ceiling, his voice gravelly and utterly drained. “That was…”
“Informative,” Catherine supplied flatly, though her pulse still thrummed in her throat.
A faint, disbelieving snort escaped him. “A word.”
Before either could muster another—a deflection, a question, an accusation—the chamber door swung inward.
It did not open with a servant’s timid knock. It was thrown open, the heavy oak connecting with the stone wall with a jarring bang that made Catherine flinch. Framed in the firelight from the outer chamber stood King Henry.
He was a tall, gaunt figure, his silhouette sharp against the gloom. He didn’t enter fully, just stood on the threshold, his eyes scanning the disheveled bed, the discarded clothing, the two of them bare and glistening in the low light. His expression was one of detached inspection, like a general surveying a battlefield at dawn.
Michael jackknifed into a sitting position, dragging a handful of crimson silk blanket over his lap. “Father.” The word was a blunt object, hurled across the room. “What is the meaning of this?”
“The meaning,” Henry said, his voice dry as parchment, “is assurance.” His gaze, pale and cold, settled on Catherine. He took a single step into the room. “The union must be binding. Unquestionable. Rumors of a barren or unconsummated marriage would sow discord before the ink on the treaty is dry. I require confirmation.”
Catherine’s skin crawled. She pulled the sheet up to her chin, the fine linen suddenly feeling insubstantial as smoke. The vulnerability was absolute, an exposure far beyond the physical. She saw the calculation in the old king’s eyes. She was a transaction. This was a receipt check.
Michael’s jaw hardened. “You have your confirmation. Now leave.”
Henry ignored him, his eyes fixed on Catherine. “Well, girl? The proof is traditionally on the sheets. Let us see it.”
A white-hot spike of fury pierced through her shock and shame. It burned away everything—the lingering daze of pleasure, the ache, the strategic subservience. This was not duty. This was desecration.
“No,” she said. The word was quiet, but clear as a bell in the hushed room.
The king blinked, as if a piece of furniture had spoken. “I beg your pardon?”
“You heard me.” Catherine sat up, letting the sheet pool at her waist. She didn’t look at Michael. All her focus was on the old king in the doorway. “The marriage is consummated. Your son can attest to it. My word, as a princess of my blood, should be sufficient. You will not inspect me like a broodmare at auction. Get out.”
The silence that followed was colder than the stone floors. Michael was utterly still beside her, a statue of tense muscle.
King Henry’s face, usually a mask of impassive authority, darkened with a sudden, venomous rage. He crossed the room in three swift strides. Before Michael could move, before Catherine could even register the shift in the air, the king’s hand lashed out.
The crack of the slap was a shockwave in the quiet chamber.
Catherine’s head snapped to the side. Pain exploded across her cheekbone, sharp and bright, followed by the copper tang of blood flooding her mouth where her teeth had cut the inside of her lip. She saw stars, clutching at the sheets for balance.
“You insolent bitch,” Henry snarled, standing over her. “You are a trophy of war. Your will is irrelevant. Your body is a vessel for my line. You speak when commanded, and you obey.”
Michael was on his feet now, a naked, formidable barrier between her and his father. “That is enough!”
But Catherine was already moving. She slowly turned her head back, locking eyes with the king. She felt the warm trickle of blood from the corner of her mouth. Deliberately, she worked her tongue, gathering the metallic saltiness in her mouth.
She didn’t shout. She didn’t flinch.
She spat.
A single, vivid arc of blood and saliva struck King Henry squarely on the cheek, sliding down towards his thin, twisted lips.
Time stopped.
Henry recoiled as if scalded, a hand flying to his face. His eyes held a pure, undiluted hatred she had never seen before. Michael froze, his body poised for violence, his gaze darting between his wife and his king.
Catherine wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, her own gaze never leaving Henry’s. “My body may be a vessel,” she said, her voice remarkably steady around the throbbing in her face. “But my mouth is my own. And that is all you will ever get from me.”
The king lowered his hand, staring at the red smudge on his fingers. A terrible calm descended over him, more frightening than his rage. He looked at his son. “Control your chattel. Or I will.”
He turned on his heel and left, pulling the door shut behind him with a quiet, final click.
The room seemed to breathe again. The fire popped. Catherine’s whole body began to tremble, a fine, uncontrollable shaking that started in her hands and radiated inward.
Michael stood motionless for another long moment, his back to her, his shoulders rigid. Then he turned. His eyes were haunted, shadowed with a conflict she couldn’t name. They went to the livid mark already rising on her cheek, to the blood on her chin.
He didn’t touch her. He didn’t speak.
He simply walked to the washbasin, wet a clean cloth in the cooling water, and brought it to her. He held it out, an offering suspended in the charged air between them.
Catherine looked at the cloth, then at his face. The stern prince was gone. In his place was a man who had just seen the foundation of his world—the absolute authority of his father, the docile nature of a wife—shatter in the space of sixty seconds.
She took the cloth. The coolness against her stinging skin was a small mercy.
“He will never forgive that,” Michael said finally, his voice low.
“I don’t require his forgiveness,” she replied, pressing the linen to her split lip. “I require his absence.”
A muscle ticked in his jaw. He looked at the door, then back at the bed, at the stark, damning evidence of their union smeared on the silk sheets. Proof for a king who had demanded it in the most vile way possible.
He sat down heavily on the edge of the mattress, the distance between them feeling both vast and infinitesimal. He stared at his own hands, the hands that had touched her with such brutal possession only moments before.
“Neither of us,” he said, almost too quietly to hear, “got what we expected tonight, did we?”
Catherine lowered the cloth, meeting his gaze in the flickering light. The taste of her own blood was still in her mouth, a pact sharper than any vow. She said nothing. The question hung there, unanswered.
Down the hall, a door slammed.